Development of inhibitory processes during the first years of primary schooling.

Abstract

Inhibition is regarded a key executive function. An influential current theoretical approach supports the existence of different inhibitory processes-perceptual, cognitive, and response inhibition. Although it has been suggested that inhibitory processes have specific development trajectories, studies that simultaneously analyze these processes through the identification of particular trajectories are still scarce and there are no studies during the first years of school-age. This is an important issue since at this stage inhibitory processes are expected to be differentiated, experiencing improvements in their functioning and intervening in the performance of various complex activities. Objective: This work aimed to analyze the development of perceptual, cognitive, and response inhibition in children who are in the first years of primary school. Methods: In Study 1 (cross-sectional), 173 children of 6-8 years of age were evaluated with perceptual, cognitive, and response inhibition tasks. In Study 2 (longitudinal), 58 children were reevaluated with the same tasks in two more times: 6 months and 1 year after the first evaluation. Different types of ANOVAs were implemented. Results: Study 1 revealed differences in performance between age groups in perceptual inhibition. Significant differences between 6 years old children with respect to 7 and 8 years old, were observed. Study 2 showed that children improved their performance in perceptual inhibition after 1 year. Improvements in cognitive inhibition were found after 1 year for children aged 6 years old. Conclusions: These results contribute to the understanding of the development of inhibition, and provide evidence favoring the nonunitary approach of inhibition. Public Significance StatementThis work suggests that the performance on the three inhibitory processes (perceptual, cognitive, and response inhibition) is different during the first half of primary school. It is important to gain understanding of each process specific development since these play a key role in the acquisition of various skills that are relevant to the daily life of children. Knowing its development in depth could allow to detect low inhibitory functioning and then intervene in order to reach optimal levels (both inhibitory processes and skills in which they are involved).

Test de Atención Infantil: análisis de las características psicométricas y valores de referencia preliminares

“…En línea con lo anterior, se reconoce un estrecho vínculo entre la atención, la percepción y los componentes básicos del funcionamiento ejecutivo: control inhibitorio, memoria de trabajo y flexibilidad cognitiva (Ariës et al, 2016;Canet-Juric et al, 2021;Zelazo et al, 2016). Así, para lograr un adecuado control atencional sobre tareas en desarrollo, es necesario un satisfactorio funcionamiento de la inhibición perceptual, es decir, la capacidad de resistir la interferencia de los estímulos distractores o irrelevantes en las tareas en curso (Aydmune et al, 2022;Brennan et al, 2017;Diamond, 2013;Friedman & Miyake, 2004). Este tipo de proceso inhibitorio ocurre a nivel perceptivo, en una etapa inicial del procesamiento de la información y en situaciones de competencia de estímulos (Introzzi et al, 2016;Aydmune et al, 2017;Aydmune et al, 2021).…”